Broken Doll
by TheDarkFlygon
Summary: During a very rainy week, an uncommon incident happens in the Ribot high school, in the North of France. The consequences are underestimated by everybody: students, teachers, administration people. The surprise is complete and worries appears as the story goes on... (Sorry for any bad grammar!)
1. Chapter 1

In some high school in the North of France, the corridors were busy at the hour of lunch, around 12AM. The students were talking quite loudly, no one looking like another, complaining about the weather and their lessons for the great majority of them. They were all wearing autumn or winter clothes, made to resist against cold temperatures and rain.

Outside of the school, whose name was told by an enormous plaque, Alexandre Ribot, the rain was pouring, making loud noises when crashing on the windows of the buildings composing the high school. The roads were slippery because of all the water that fell from the sky that wasn't drying out.

The floors of the school all had some of this water staggering on the linoleum that was used to cover where the students and teachers were walking all the day long, from 7AM to 6PM most generally.

It was some normal Tuesday noon, at first glance. Nothing was out of the ordinary. On the second floor, around the doors of the polyvalent room of the school, students were going to class or to the cafeteria to have lunch. Some were almost falling on the floor, their shores slipping, but were caught by their friend before they could touch the ground with their hands.

In the middle of moving groups of people, a young woman was climbing the stairs. According to her clothes, a black suit and a light white pull with a V collar, she was a teacher. She had two bags: a grey one where she had her teaching stuff and a tiny black one where were her personal belongings. Her heeled black boots were making nose each time she was walking.

This woman was Mrs. Jonquille, the youngest History-Geography teacher of the entire school. She was around thirty years old, according to her. Her personal facts, such as her age and couple situation, remained a mystery after one year teaching at Ribot either for her current students than for her former ones. This school year, 2014-2015, she was the History teacher of five classes: the 2D4 and 2D8 ones, Tenth Graders, the 1STMG2 and 1STMG3 ones, Eleventh Graders specialized in firm management and the TS2 one, Twelve Graders specialized in Physics, Chemistry and Biology.

In the corridor, she crossed the way of a girl teenager with dark blond hair and blue eyes. She was wearing a dark grey jacket with green fabric strings. A little black bag was hanging over her left shoulder and was by her right hip. She also had a white backpack with a grey and light purple flower pattern on her back, where she was putting her copybooks and school books.

The History teacher said hello to this girl. The latter was one of her former pupil from the previous year: Justine Lhotar, now in the 1ES1 class, and so a Eleventh Grader specialized in economics and sociology, along with a lot of History-Geography lessons. The previous year, she was in the 2D4 class, the only Tenth Grade class her History teacher had in this high school.

Justine returned the hello with a smile before continuing her road to the cafeteria, since her lunch hour was from 12AM to 1PM. Her shoes, which had very little heels, were making almost no noise compared to the general sea composed of the various sounds made by the many students passing by.

Juliette was about to climb the last step of the stair when her right shoe's heel placed wrongly on the previous step. This misplacement caused her right foot to slip, making her whole body fall backward. The wet floor was making the fall impossible to avoid. The teacher tried to grip something to prevent her from smashing on the ground, but her hands couldn't find anything that wasn't all slippery.

Eventually, the young woman fell on the very bottom of her back, before landing on the second to the end step, in front of around ten students who stopped talking. Ashamed, Juliette quickly looked to the people around her. In the crowd, Justine Lhotar had her eyes showing how much she had been shocked by what she had just witnessed.

"Mistress… Are you okay?!" asked the Eleventh Grader, her voice yelling, while she was getting closer to her former teacher.

The latter was surprised by this reaction, as she was rubbing the bottom of her back, which was very painful because of violently it smashed on the floor. Her right eye was closed and she was biting her bottom lip before her look turned to her former student. She knew lying to her would be useless about her pain. Whoever was around, she would have to tell her the truth.

"I guess I am…" Replied Mrs. Jonquille with a faint smile, trying to reassure the teenager apparently worried for her, according to her eyes.

Then, Juliette tried to get up. During this try, her legs were shaking a lot, looking hurt, like she had bruises on her knees. Eventually, she fell again in the stairs, in the front of people leaving the stairs to go to class or to eat lunch.

Justine got right next to her former teacher. She had a worried look in her eyes and her mouth was slightly open, looking like if she was going to say something but didn't dare to. All she did was stay close to the one who fell.

The History teacher tried to get up again, only to fail one more time. Her hips were very painful, but she tried to ignore that dolor coming from her bones. Her eyes looked up to her former pupil's ones, before seeing in them her reflected worries. Finally, she sighed, giving up any hope to get up on her own.

Instead, Juliette pulled out her mobile phone from her little bag, still on her shoulder. It was a thin phone, approximatively the height of her hand, all black. Its screen, taking most of the usable space, was tactical. With her fingers, she inserted a phone number and called it. She was calling an ambulance.

The woman dressed in black tried to retain her tears while asking Justine to leave. Very worried, she did so just to obey her former teacher. The Eleventh Grader went ahead to the cafeteria, her hunger disappeared in one strike.

A few minutes later, an ambulance came to the Ribot high school. They got the injured one and left, in the front of all the students astonished to see such a carriage so suddenly in their good old school.

The worst was yet to come…


	2. Chapter 2

Two men, a fair-skinned one with short chestnut hair and pale blue eyes covered by his square-shaped glasses and a dark-skinned bald one with brown eyes, put the stretcher where the injured teacher had been hung on in the ambulance's large trunk. They then sat on the two seats in the front of the vehicle.

Juliette looked at her surroundings, trying to forget how painful her pelvis was. The roof of the ambulance's interior was the same as its exterior: made of blank white metal with a very weak shine because of how dark the back of the vehicle was. The "walls" were identical to the "ceiling" of the trunk.

The floor was covered in some dirty dark grey linoleum. This linoleum was made to prevent any slide because of the wheels of the stretchers the back of the ambulance was carrying. The injured person hung on the stretcher shouldn't fall while the car was rolling. The door was firmly shut, preventing anything from falling from the ambulance during the travels.

The young woman then looked where she had been hung on. The stretcher was made in a bright red, thick fabric. It had bands made in a shiny silver, much thinner one. Her body was covered by a bright gold cover made in what she could guess as the same material than the silver strips. She couldn't see her own shoulders.

When Juliette tried to move her hands, they were stopped by some straps made out of a gripping fabric. Having rubbed these strips, her wrists' skin had been a little damaged. The pain coming from them was very weak, especially compared to the one coming from her hips.

Her brown eyes tried to retain her tears, but didn't last longer than two minutes. Then, drops flowed from them, wetting her cheeks on their path. To prevent her from whimpering, the teacher bit her inferior lip with her teeth, forcing her mouth to be closed. No way would she want these two men she didn't know to hear her suffering.

Her legs weren't responding to her. Her knees and her ankles were both blocked by the same kind of straps that prevented her wrists from moving. The chestnut-haired woman felt imprisoned, but at the same time, her mind was relativizing: at least, she wouldn't fall again and injure herself even more.

The travel felt like it lasted hours for the injured teacher. The dolor coming from her pelvis was too much to handle for her with the stress coming from what happened at Ribot less than thirty minutes before. She was shameful and ashamed. But, at the same time, she knew it was impossible for her to get up when she realized how hurt her pelvis was.

The light lighting Juliette's surroundings was weaker and weaker as time and distance were passing by. Soon, her eyes couldn't distinguish anything between her tears and the progressing darkness while her pain was keeping her away from trying to see more.

Eventually, the ambulance arrived in front of an enormous white building. It had no windows on the side who would give a view on the parking where cars from hospitalized persons and their visitors were parked. Its' name was graved on this same side: "Centre Hospitalier d'Helfaut".

When the dark-skinned man, who was driving, parked the ambulance, opened the double door at the back of the vehicle, his workmate and he were astonished. The cause of their great surprise was the woman they were carrying to the hospital, who fainted, her pain having become unbearable for her weakened body.

A couple hours later, Juliette woke up, her vision too blurry for her to distinguish anything from her surroundings. The light, now intensely coming from the large windows of the room she was in, was blinding her, as she was covering her eyes with her hands, now free.

Her eyes adapted to the sudden change of light intensity during a few minutes, while her global vision was clearing itself. She was in a square-shaped room with bright white walls, as white as the ceiling above her head. The door of this room was at her left, made out of wood painted in a soft blue. The door's handle was made out of white plastic.

The chestnut-haired woman then looked to her close surroundings. She was lying on a hospital bed made of clear wood and metal, her body directly on a white mattress and her head on a big pillow of the same color. Her hair had been tied up on the top of her head for some reason, probably for preventing it from flowing over her head during her sleep.

Much to her surprise, Juliette wasn't feeling any pain coming from her hips. It looked like the dolor vanished away while she was unconscious. She then realized why her pelvis wasn't hurting anymore when she tried to move her legs when she noticed there was a drip hanging from a stand nearby her bed. This drip was filled with a transparent liquid directly injected right above her left hip.

The young woman was trying to read what was written on the tag of the drip, but it was too far for her eyes to read. As she was trying to get up so she could read the tag, her torso couldn't do the half of the task she wanted it to do. Curious about what was preventing her from doing so, the History teacher looked under her covers.

Her eyes opened wide when she saw what she had on her pelvis and hips. It was a large plaster surrounding the source of the pain, blocking any movement of her legs, numbing them completely.

Juliette started to have a lot of questions about this plaster as she was looking at the ceiling again. How was she going to walk with this? No, the question of walking wasn't even to be asked: of course she wasn't going to be capable to walk with her plastered pelvis. But how was she going to fulfill her basic needs? Hunger and thirst were obvious, but how was she going to do for her bladder needs? No way could she get up to go to the toilets.

The chestnut-haired woman then felt that something was off compared to before she was hospitalized. It wasn't her plaster or her tied hair, for sure, but… When looking to her legs again, she noticed her legs were unclothed, completely nude. When looking at her arms again, she also saw that she wasn't wearing the same clothes than in the morning. Instead of her usual black suit, the teacher was now dressed in a soft green medical nightgown-like dress with short sleeves.

The surprise was full for Juliette. Why was she wearing whole new clothes? Where her own ones were now? She was as confused as she was astonished by this change. Her gold watch also had disappeared from her right wrist, now being on the little table next to the bed. Instead, there was at its place some kind of white medical bracelet, indicating some facts about the new patient.

There was written on this bracelet in black ink:

"Patient n° 26458 - JONQUILLE Juliette | Injure section | Room n°205"

The hospitalized woman sighed, before whispering to herself: "So I'm here for a good amount of time, if they gave me such a bracelet and this enormous plaster…"

Her eyes were reflecting how sorry she was for her students. How long would she stay hospitalized, in this bed? More than one week, that was sure. She was going to be late for her programs… She couldn't possibly penalize her Twelfth Graders for their History-Geography exam because she injured her pelvis. This would be unfair to them.

Then, someone knocked at the door of the hospital room. Surprised, the patient said "yes", to allow the person willing to enter to come in. It couldn't be a visitor, since she was conscious for only twenty minutes now. The drip was already almost empty, making the pain slowly come back. It must have been someone coming to replace it or a doctor telling her about her pelvis, according to the young woman stuck in her bed.

An old man, around fifty-five years old then opened the door and came in, closing behind him. He had grey hair and pale green eyes covered by his grey glasses. He was wearing a lab coat with a pocket where there was a black pen over a white shirt whose buttons were all closed and a black tie without any pattern on it.

He came closer to the bed and took a chair near from it. He then sat on the same chair, while his patient read the little label stuck on the coat. On it was written "Sir DIANGOSTICK David". He was the physician in charge of the History teacher who fell in the stairs of the nearby high school.

Sir Diangostick said hello to his patient, who turned it back. His eyes were cold, like he was reproaching something to the young woman. His voice was emotionless, as calm as it was monotone. He then took the files he had with him when entering the room and put them on the bed table near him.

Then, the physician said to the injured woman: "Mrs. Jonquille, I will be honest with you: it's been a long time ago since I had someone with the same injure as you for the last time. Your pelvis has been fractured when you fell in the stairs this morning. I think you guessed you are unable to walk."

The patient sighed, disappointed of herself. She was still very shameful about falling into the stairs in front of so many students, making them late for some. She was a clumsy teacher who was cursing everyone she was failing in front of!

"Yeah… I just want to know… How long am I going to be in bed like this? And hospitalized globally?" replied Juliette, also asking.

"Respectively around one week and one week and a half. You are lucky we are able to make you move out of bed so quickly, Mistress. Your injury could have been way worse than what you have" said Mr. Diangostick.

"I… I know it can always get worse… But… It's too much time wasted…" she timidly responded, fearing that her doctor would be angry at her for such a reply.

"Too much time wasted? What do you mean by that, Mistress? It's such a short delay" he reacted, having trouble to understand the other point of view.

"I… I can't let my students without their teacher for so long… What if my replacement is bad? What if they don't get any replacement at all?! I… I need to get out of here as quickly as possible!" started to panic the History teacher.

She then gritted her teeth, her pelvis hurting again as badly as before.


	3. Chapter 3

The doctor didn't know what to do. What was happening so suddenly? His patient didn't seem to having done anything that would cause such a sudden and sharp pain. He looked at his surroundings, searching what could cause this. He then saw the drip completely empty, not containing any drop of morphine anymore.

But, when he got closer to it, he noticed it was still containing some liquid, about half of its original volume. Not understanding, he then looked under the cover of the bed. Sir Diangostick then saw blood tainting the fabric around the young woman's body, precisely her left hip. The red liquid was coming from a little hole, its size around the end of the drip's pipe's nozzle.

The said nozzle was on the ground, having detached from the skin where it was pouring morphine into. The question wasn't how it got detached, but more how to put it again where it was. The doctor was thinking about this problem, the drip's pipe in his right hand, when a sharp scream got him out of his thoughts.

Juliette was crying under the dolor she was the victim of once again. Her right fist smashed on its own a little orange button over her pillow, stuck in the wall. There was a schematic representation of a nurse painted on it in white, explaining its function: calling a nurse if it was needed to do so. The picture had been erased a bit by the time flowing, dating back from the nineties already.

Sir Diangostick reacted as soon as he saw the button lighting up, signaling it had been used some moments ago. He would need to explain the problem and secure the nozzle of the drip to prevent such incidents of this kind later on. Especially for this patient, that was physically weaker than average for her age, height and weight.

A nurse came quickly after the hospitalized teacher pressed the button. She had shoulder-heighted chestnut hair and pale green eyes, reminding the doctor's ones. She also had rectangle-shaped grey glasses and was wearing a very light pastel blue dress where a small rectangle made out of plastic was pinned on. On this tag was written "Mrs. DIANGOSTICK Félicité – Nurse". She was the eldest daughter of David Diangostick and was around thirty years old.

After that, Juliette couldn't distinguish anything anymore because of how blurred her vision was by her tears, now that she was crying. The last thing she could see and know what was going around was the nurse getting out of the room, running, before everything faded to black, the pain making her lose consciousness once again.

After a while, she eventually woke up. She felt no pain coming from her pelvis once again, but she feared it would return to hurt her even more. Her surroundings where identical: same white walls and ceiling, same floor, same bed. Even her watch was at the same place as it was before. Only Sir Diangostick was missing now, having left to see his other patients.

The young woman sighed, now being all alone again. Time was passing slowly in the hospital room, the clock tickling signaling any second passing by. She thought about what she could do to keep her busy. Searching for her bag, in order to correct tests, she saw it at the other side of the room, way too far for her to reach it. She sighed again, already pissed off by her injury.

Despite being exhausted by her work lately, Juliette was unable to sleep. Her thoughts were preventing her from falling asleep, much to her disagreement. Why was it so difficult for her to do such simple tasks? She didn't know the answer to a lot of the questions she was asking herself. But, when she was trying to stop thinking about them, they came back to her mind, and the problem wasn't solved in the slightest.

The injured teacher was thinking about her students. How were they going to do anything without her for their exams? How her Tenth Graders were going to learn how to correctly do their work if she wasn't there to teach them how to do, like she was supposed to? She was afraid her replacement would be one of those bad teachers, like Sabrina or Vauban's headmaster's daughter, the one that "stole" her place at this high school in the summer.

While looking around, her eyes saw a wheelchair right next to the bed. Juliette then had an idea how to get out of her bed and grab her bags, especially her mobile phone. She called out for a nurse once again, in hope this person would agree to put her in the wheelchair so she could circulate in the hospital instead of resting in this bed.

But then, her doctor's advices came back to her mind, reminding her she couldn't get out the bed, especially all alone like that. The reason why her pelvis started to hurt again was still unknown of her, but it had something to do with the drip. Maybe it was empty, after all, it was a transparent liquid and the difference between the drip being full or empty didn't exist from her place.

Then, someone knocked at the door. The patient said "yes" to permit to the visitor to come inside. Curious about who it could be, she thought it was Sir Diangostick explaining what happened with her pelvis and why it hurt once again so suddenly.

A young, chestnut-haired woman with light blue eyes then entered. Her high heels were resounding in the room while she walked in. Her hair was long and curly, pushed back with only some little streaks around her face, near her ears. She was wearing a white dress with a flower pattern in soft pastel colors and lace around the neck and wrists.

She had a worried look on her face, without any smile. The woman came closer to the bed of the room and asked if she could sit next to it. The hospitalized woman said that she could, with a fake smile on her own face, like she was doing all the time. But this mask was already broken, much to her misfortune.

"Oh, Sarah…! What brings you here…?" said the History teacher, looking at her close workmate.

"You know what brings me here, Juliette" she replied, her voice trying to be cold.

"Hmm, yeah, I guess I'm stupid to ask such a question… Listen, I'm sorry for tomorrow afternoon, but you're gonna need someone else to accompany the outing with the Literature-Society group…" apologized Juliette, guilt resounding in her voice.

"No, you can't fucking do that to me Juliette! Not now! You know it was hard to get the funds and the approval of the administration?!" yelled Sarah, outraged by these apologies, her eyes reflecting anger as her voice was louder and louder after each word she was pronouncing.

"Sarah, calm down please! I know how frustrating it must be for you to find someone else so quickly, I would have loved to come but… I just can't!" replied her desperate colleague, panicked by how upset her workmate was.

"I don't fucking care Juliette! What is stopping you from coming? Bruises?! Laziness?!" she snapped, furious.

The unlucky teacher blinked, afraid of her own workmate. Sarah Leeht was a French teacher from Ribot, new to the school. They were working together as a pair in a special teaching called Literature-Society for Tenth Graders every Tuesday afternoon.

Sarah was usually a very calm young woman, keeping her calm most of the time. She had those smiling eyes when she wasn't tired or angry.

"I… I... You know I would have come if I was just in overwork but…" muttered Juliette, almost numbed by her fears.

"But what?! Don't tell me you broke you something by falling on your ass! What laziness bought you in a hospital instead of the infirmary, hmm?!" replied the French teacher, her voice still as angry, if not even angrier than before.

Suddenly, the patient got her cover off, revealing to Sarah what was the real cause of her incapacity to accompany the outing. The seeing of her workmate's plaster, and by the same way her injury, calmed down the other teacher, feeling sorry for having gotten pissed off so easily at her, without knowing her reasons.

"I'm…I'm so sorry Juliette I didn't know that… Oh, God, I understand why you can't now…" said Sarah, with a hesitating voice, as her eyes looked to the ground, ashamed.

The two were silent during a while. Minutes were passing without any of them dared to speak, afraid to make yet another mistake that would either hurt or upset the other one. Eventually, the hospitalized one lifted her head towards her workmate.

"That's alright Sarah, you were upset" she said, with a warm smile on her face, her eyes filled with a soft feeling.

A bit after, they were talking of their usual talking subjects: work, friends, centers of interest, likes and dislikes. The two teachers looked like two good friends hanging out, without any sign of worry or guilt, not even a trace of sadness in their laughing eyes. Soon, they forgot they were in a hospital room for a case of broken pelvis…


End file.
